February 2011

February 28, 2011

In no other country does the media practically drool the way it does in India over its annual federal budget. For India’s finance ministers giving budget speeches has become a performance art, neither part of which, neither performance nor art, do they live up to. How can they? The national budget, or any budget for that matter, is a numbingly boring, albeit essential, number crunching exercise.

The signature visual of the budget story is nothing more than the finance minister holding aloft his briefcase supposedly containing his closely guarded budget speech. In reality, we don’t know what the briefcase contains. For all you know it contains nothing. But the sense of purpose with which the finance minister poses with the briefcase outside the parliament you would think it contains the key to a fabled treasure.

To be accurate, it makes sense to guard the budget proposals zealously because any leaks could be used by corporations to game the system. Not that they don’t already do it, but prior knowledge of what the budget proposals contain could be particularly lucrative. So in some sense when the finance minister flashes the briefcase, as if telling the rest of the country that in it lies locked their future, it is not entirely wrong.

Just how excited the media gets about the budget proposals was evident while watching Dr. Prannoy Roy, India’s preeminent news anchor, ask Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee a couple of times last night whether he would consider raising the income tax exemption limit to Rs. 200,000. In his latest budget presented yesterday Mukherjee has raised it from Rs. 160,000 to Rs. 180,000.

For those of you who may not follow such details what this means is that in India if you earn Rs. 180,000 a year (that is about $ 4,000) you will now be exempt from paying any income tax from next year. Dr. Roy, with his eye firmly on his audience, came across as if he was not just asking whether the finance minister would but actually importuning Mukherjee to make it Rs. 200,000 (about $ 4,500) right there on his show. In return, Mukherjee, a seasoned politician and a veteran of budget making, gave nothing away other than a wide smile.

India’s 2011-2012 budget is pegged at Rs. 12.58 trillion or about $ 280 billion. In contrast, the United States’ federal budget for 2011 as requested by President Barack Obama in February last year, is $ 3.83 trillion. To put it in perspective, America’s federal deficit this year is four a half times larger than India’s total budget allocations.

And here is one final point. The Indian budget addresses a population of 1.2 billion, while the US budget takes care of a little over 311 million people living in a land nearly four times the size of India. But I never see the US treasury secretary holding aloft a briefcase for the media and then going on to make a 110-minute speech followed by dozens of interviews discussing matters as thrilling as a new subsidy regime on farm nutrients and direct cash transfers to the users of fertilizers and kerosene. All very important and life-giving no doubt, but still not as emblematic as the income tax exemption limit for the middle class.

Does it make any more sense to let Sachin Tendulkar play cricket any more at all? I think it is time to consecrate him inside a shrine where he is the only deity in front of whom the cricketing world stands transfixed, looking bewitched and saying "Kudart ki leela aparampar hai (Nature's spectacle is relentless)." Once their awe is suitably struck the rest of the cricketers can then go on to pursue their own lower levels of deficient cricket.

For a long time I have felt that Tendulkar gets out purely on compassionate grounds or out of sheer ennui bred by a genius not fully challenged or tested. If I were Yuvraj Singh, I would ask myself the questions, "Should I even be here? Why am I doing this to myself?" (This is a completely gratuitous crack at Yuvraj Singh but I could not think of any other name right away.)

Watching Tendulkar score yet another century against England yesterday, I began to think all over again about the futility of judging Tendulkar using cricket's usual set of benchmarks or even judging him at all. For me it has come to a point where I would not mind if Sachin Tendulkar just walks out of the game even before his straight drive has bruised past the bowler. While he is leaving he can say, "Is this the best you got?", something which is totally out of character for him but still.

What the sages have said about excess of anything not being good is so compellingly illustrated by Tendulkar. The excess of his genius cannot possibly be good, even for himself. But I suppose he is stuck with it, to paraphrase Rupert Pupkin (Robert De Niro) in ‘The King of Comedy.’

He is 38 and with 98 international centuries all that remains for him to do is to smile beatifically at the world and say, “Are you entertained?” (This quote from Maximus (Russell Crowe) in ‘Gladiator.’)

Note to readers: After my charger failed, I bought a new one, which failed too and then electricity was switched off to relay some of the cables. Hence the gap in updating the blog.

February 27, 2011

Just as I began recovering from a bout of bad health, my laptop charger has failed. Consequently, I am unable to update my blog for the second day running. Not that my admirers are knocking down my main door screaming betrayal, I think I owe an explanation to the precious few who do read it regularly. It should be back to normal by Monday.

February 25, 2011

After a visit to a pre-historic hill in Saurashtra yesterday, I have been laid low by a strange combination of wasting body, stomach acid overflow and migraine. It might take a few hours to recover. I will write more later.

February 24, 2011

I don’t know about you but I think it is just about time to stop being delirious with joy every time Apple seems set to launch a new edition of iSomethingortheOther. It is also time for Apple to spin all their products as if they would rescue this world from its wretchedness.

March 2 is supposed to be the day when the company has scheduled a special event to announce something. That something, the Apple faithful anticipate practically queering, could well be iPad2 with…hold it…hold it….a camera. It could also be a much thinner iPad with a camera or with multiple versions of itself or may have a USB port or it could have a sharper screen or could carry better speakers or may become Flash compatible or perhaps all of the above.

Here is what I would consider revolutionary—iPad2 whose screen is smudge-free. Now that would be a breakthrough nothing short of achieving the Grand Unified Theory. I mean almost. A smudge-free iPad2 would definitely draw me out into the street delirious with joy.

February 23, 2011

I was only into the second year of my now inordinately long journalistic career when my senior colleague Sidharth Bhatia at the Free Press Journal assigned me my first feature story ever. It was about ghazal singer Vatsala Mehra. On my return to the office after interviewing her at her opulent Pali Hill apartment in Bombay, Sidharth asked me what I thought of her. Her voice is mellifluous was what I said and how I described it in my story. That she was attractive I told Sidharth offline.

Vatsala and I caught up nearly as many years later via Facebook, she in Washington D.C. and I in Chicago. I placed a quick call to her early last year and was greeted by the same voice, only a little deeper. She was as effusive about her singing as she was then. In fact, she was on her way to a concert tour of India last year.

Now she is yet again performing at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as part of ‘Maximum India’ celebration between March 1 and 20. This is a signature event where 500 Indian artists will treat audiences to all things Indian. It is only fitting that Vatsala will be one of those 500 artists, having pursued ghazal, sufi, thumri and geet for a long time with unceasing passion.

If you happen to be in D.C. March 8 I suggest you attend her performance at 8 p.m. at the Eisenhower Theater. And if you don’t happen to be in D.C. I suggest you do happen to be there. She sings as if she is fundamentally happy with herself. When a singer does that it transmits to her audience.

February 22, 2011

There are many ways to deal with a popular revolt. One is to go from “house to house” and kill your opponents as Libya’s phantom leader Muammar Gaddafi is now threatening to do.

The problem with that approach is purely logistical. I mean to go from house to house and killing your detractors could be overwhelming, not to mention time consuming. And yes, downright psychopathic. And did I mention inhuman? That too.

The easiest way for Gaddafi would be to come out in Green Square in Tripoli unarmed and alone and just stand without saying a word. I think that will settle the four-decade-old argument.

This is no time to be flippant or facetious, especially if you are a Libyan in Benghazi or Tobruk or even Tripoli. It is literally a question of life and death. Media reports say that thousands of Gaddafi’s supporters have come out in Green Square armed with large machetes and other weapons. Their intention is to search and kill the protestors wherever they may be found.

The contrast between the way the three dictators in Tunisia (Ben Ali), Egypt (Hosni Mubarak) and Libya (Gaddafi) have dealt with massive uprisings could not be more striking. Ben Ali ran for his life, Mubarak tried to muscle and brazen it out but eventually gave up and Gaddafi is on a house to house killing mission.

Gaddafi would have been a genuinely comical masterpiece of a character had he not been despotic, cruel and evidently psychopathic. It would have been hard to create a fictional character like him. Sometimes I get the sense that there is really no one like Gaddafi. He is indeed like the fictional Phantom, the Ghost who Walks but one on the wrong side of everything. He seems like the kind of character surrealist master Salvador Dali would have painted.

What is the hallmark of a dictator? He is someone who would not forget to carry his umbrella as he goes out to prove that he has not fled his country. Merely because thousands of his own people are being strafed by his own aircraft it does not mean that he should get his expensive robe wet in rain. Now if that is not fictional, what is? The only problem with this perspective is that those who died were not fictional. They were real people.

February 21, 2011

India is set to amend its 54-year-old Copyright Act in a manner that could potentially transform the economics for writers, music composers and other content creators. The 1957 law is now being updated to reflect the realities of 2011.

IANS offers the following highlights from the amendment that is expected to pass in the budget session of India’s parliament. Once that is done, according to the wire service, the new Copyright Act will be in conformity with international treaties. “It introduces a system of statutory licensing to protect the owners of literary or musical works,” the agency says.

Highlights:

* Copyright in a film currently rests with the producer for 60 years. The bill extends copyright to a director as well, but for 70 years. In some cases, this amendment also applies to films produced before the bill.

* The bill makes special provisions for those whose work is used in films or sound recordings (e.g. lyricists or composers). Rights to royalties from such works, when used in media other than films or sound recordings, shall rest with the creator of the work and can only be assigned to heirs, or copyright societies which act in their interests.

* The bill allows for the production of copyrighted work in special formats (such as Braille), for use by persons with disability, without infringing copyright. It also specifies a procedure by which work can be produced in general formats, for use by such persons.

* The act gives authors, or their representatives, the right to claim damages against use of their work (while under copyright), in a way which adversely affects their reputation. The bill allows such a right to be exercised indefinitely, as opposed to being restricted to the term of copyright, as is the case currently.

P.S.: What it means is that even if you in your mind recite some of the lines or perspectives from my blog or any other writing without my permission, you will have to pay me royalty. I exaggerate, of course, to make a point.

February 20, 2011

Having lived in Pakistan long enough, Raymond Davis had perfected his peripheral vision. As an American “diplomat”, quickly sizing up his surroundings was an ability no longer unique to Davis. It was now a career requirement for all members of US diplomatic missions.

There was nothing like casually stepping out of a US mission property in Pakistan any more. Every outing was like an elaborate security dance for mission staffers.

That crisp January day in Lahore when Davis’s white Civic Honda with a local registration plate approached the the Qurtaba Chowk traffic signal he saw two men riding a motorcycle alongside of his vehicle. Moments later he had pulled out his semi-automatic Glock pistol and fired on the riders. Both men died as did a third bystander who was run over another vehicle following Davis’.

Within hours US-Pakistan relations were hurtling toward their worst diplomatic crisis in recent times, drawing out a personage no less than President Barack Obama demanding Davis’s immediate release. Davis, a 36-year-old former special forces soldier, has been described by the Obama administration as an "administrative and technical official" at the US consulate in Lahore. Washington has insisted Davis enjoys diplomatic immunity, while Pakistan has responded saying he is a murder suspect.

This Robert Ludlum like real life thriller is showing signs that Davis may be what many suspected in the immediate aftermath of the shootings which he described as self-defense. The Guardian reports that Davis is a CIA agent on assignment at the time of the incident.

“Based on interviews in the US and Pakistan, the Guardian can confirm that the 36-year-old former special forces soldier is employed by the CIA. "It's beyond a shadow of a doubt," said a senior Pakistani intelligence official,” the Guardian said.

Considering that Obama himself has got involved Davis seems like an important asset for the US government. There has been speculation that he could be a significant player in America’s drone attacks on targets in the tribal areas of Pakistan. The Davis arrest could easily escalate into a defining standoff between the two countries with global consequences.

Pakistan says the two bike riders were robbers and Davis used excessive force in the name of self-defense. Unanswered questions abound in this case. The most obvious being what Davis was doing armed with a semi-automatic Glock pistol as well as “a long-range radio, a GPS device, an infrared torch and a camera with pictures of buildings around Lahore,” according to the Guardian. Equally, why were the two riders, whom Pakistan strangely describes as thieves or robbers, in Davis’ pursuit?

Nothing seems straight about this case. No one should be surprised if the case suddenly falls off the radar with both sides agreeing to brush it under the carpet. However, as of now Pakistan has attached its national sovereignty to the Davis investigation. And that is not a promising sign.

Note: The early parts of this post have taken some dramatic license, although facts as reported extensively have not been changed at all.

February 19, 2011

If America were a cricket playing nation instead of a baseball playing one, Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi, the Iraqi man who lied about the existence of biological weapons in his country, would have been called Doosra and not Curveball. Equally, he could have been called Googly as well.

There is no particular relevance of this opening to the basic point of today’s post. I just wanted to get the equivalent out of my system. Both curveball and doosra/googly are about using the laws of aerodynamics to turn the ball into or away from the batsman/batter and can be very hard to play. They are designed to be deceptive by the pitcher/bowler. Both use forms of topspin that can surprise those at the receiving end. So to that extent what al-Janabi did can be aptly described by the baseball/cricket terminologies.

Of course, what al-Janabi did was way more egregious than Sandy Koufax might have done with his curveball or Saqlain Mushtaq with his doosra. His completely manufactured “intelligence” about Iraq’s non-existent biological weapons (more popularly known as the weapons of mass destruction or WMDs) was used as the main justification by the Bush administration to invade Iraq in March, 2003.

The Guardian of London has recently carried an interview with al-Janabi, who was called Curveball by the US intelligence, in which he has essentially said he pulled the WMD claims out of his ass. The claims should not have passed the smell test considering their origin (pardon the pathetic pun) but instead they were used by the highest decision makers in the US to start a war of choice and not necessity. I do not want to get into the merits or demerits of the Iraq invasion because it is a debate that cannot and should not be resolved by a blog post.

What can be commented upon in a blog though is the terrible predicament that Colin Powell, who was the US Secretary of State at the time of the invasion and who made a very public case in favor of the impending invasion before the UN security council just a month before the “shock and awe” attacks, finds himself in. Curveball’s candid admission that he just lied because he wanted to oust Saddam Hussein has cast Powell in a highly unflattering light. He is now scrambling to explain his own conduct in uncritically swallowing what appears to be fabricated intelligence.

Powell has demanded that the CIA and Pentagon explain why they did not alert him to the unreliability of Curveball’s assertions. It is disingenuous for Powell to feel outraged seven years after the fact. For someone who was the chairman of joint chiefs of staff at the time of the first Gulf War, should have known little better than what he was handed by the Bush White House to read out from at the UN security council. I have never quite understood why Powell, who was apparently not in favor of the invasion, chose to go along with the decision. His sense of loyalty as a soldier only partly explains it. However, his conscience should have trumped his soldierly convictions in this particular case.

P.S.: In reality, curveballs are like in-swingers especially because of the way the ball is gripped while pitching both. The index and middle fingers and the thumb form a sort of letter C around the seam of the ball in both cases. I suspect if the curveball was actually allowed to hit the ground prepared like a cricket pitch it too would swing.